The village of Assais, when the battle was over, presented a ghastly spectacle. Among the dead and dying that cumbered its streets the Saxon soldiers were searching diligently for wounded comrades, who were carried to the castle, where the regimental surgeons had their hands full.
The wounded officers, of whom there were not a few, were carried into the dining-hall, where pallets had been arranged, upon which they might rest for the brief space of time that the regiment could remain in Assais. Its work of vengeance completed, it must immediately fall back again upon Nontron.
The colonel's face was grimly sad as he entered the hall for a personal inspection of the wounded. "We have suffered heavily," he said to Count Styrum, who, with his arm in a sling, approached him. "Much noble blood has been shed, and I take blame to myself for it."
"What possible blame can attach to you, colonel?"
"I might have nipped the treachery here in the bud. From the first I mistrusted that Baron de Nouart and his tool Gervais. But for my weakness they would both have been brought to a court-martial, and then all their villainous schemes would have come to light, your arm, Styrum, would have been free from a sling, and your best friends, Hohenwald and Poseneck, would not be lying there severely wounded. How is it with Arno? What does the surgeon say?"
"He gives us good hope. The wound is serious; he is still unconscious, but the surgeon says that he thinks careful nursing will bring him round."
"Careful nursing!" said the colonel. "And where is he to get careful nursing in this God-forgotten corner of France? In two hours at the latest we must take up our march for Nontron, and even there our wounded cannot rest. I must send them on farther. What nursing can they have in the nearest hospital? They are all over-crowded. And can Hohenwald bear the transportation to a hospital?"
"He can bear a farther journey than that if taken carefully. I believe, colonel, that I can save Hohenwald's life if you will allow of my undertaking his transportation to the only place where he will find health for both body and soul."
"I do not understand you, Count."
"Upon a charming estate on the Rhine, near S----, a lady has established a private hospital; beneath her care Arno will, I am sure, recover."